In a number of industries, such as the agricultural and food, petroleum, pharmaceutical or chemical industries, it is often necessary to undertake the packaging of predetermined quantities of liquid or pasty, homogeneous or heterogeneous products intended for sale, this packaging requiring the transfer of products of more or less high viscosity from a storage container to a receptacle such as a plastic cup, a bottle, a jar, a can or the like. The filling of these receptacles is generally carried out in series, with the aid of machines incorporating at least one filling station supplied by at least one storage container, the receptacles passing one after another in front of the filling station at a predetermined rate.
In the bottling and packaging of liquid products, it is necessary to meter fairly precise quantities of product to comply with most state laws on labeling and packaging a product. Moreover, many problems exist with volumetric devices because of the nature of the product itself. For instance, some liquid products tend to expand when being handled either by dissolving air, by foaming or sudsing. Moreover, liquid products are quite often difficult to dispense from a volumetric device because of dripping or clinging to the side walls of the device. Further, many problems have been encountered in volumetric filling devices through the buildup of sediment or coatings on the surface so that the measured volume will vary through a work day. In the filling of containers from a volumetric metering device, production is quite often dependent on the speed with which the container is filled.
To comply with regulations, it is necessary to establish accurately the quantity of product allowed to enter each receptacle. In particular, in the case of serial filling, it is necessary that quantities of products allowed to enter all the receptacles correspond to a stated volume or weight, this volume of this weight being capable of appearing on a label affixed to each receptacle. However, problems still arise when attempting to fill containers. In particular, in high-speed liquid/fluid dispensing mechanisms imprecise (excess or deficient) quantities of liquid/fluid may be dispersed from a nozzle into a plurality of containers.